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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



Poems of 

Frances Guignard Gtbbes 



Poems of 

Frances Guignard Gibbes 



Washington 

The Neale Publishing Company 

431 Eleventh Street N. W. 

MCMII 



THE LIBRARY OF 
@ONGRESS, 

Two OopiB* KeoEivea 

MAR tg"1902 

COPVW«HT ENTRY 

0LAS3 (V XXo. Nu. 

COPY a 



7€)35I3 



Copyright, 1902, by The Neale Publishing Company 



Dedicated 
TO MY Father and Mother 



These pages were written during moods when my 
only aspiration was to grasp more completely the 
insights to which they pertain, and I have not subse- 
quently attempted to alter or rearrange them. These 
sketches are integral parts of a larger fulfillment in 
which they will find their chief justification and fuller 
meaning. 



CONTENTS 
¥¥ 

PAGX 

A Crisis 18 

A Miracle 57 

Brotherhood 58 

Distribution 11 

God's Erect 61 

In Minor Tonk 21 

Interpretation of Titian's " Assumption " . .33 

Invocation 38 

Joy 64 

Justice 63 

Law 56 

Love's Tribute 31 

Making a Masterpiece 25 

Might 53 

My Inwardness 24 

Mysterious Light 40 

Opportunity 34 

Recognition 50 

9 



PAGE 

EOYALTY 48 

Serenity 62 

Shorn Wings 23 

Sketches from Nature 47 

Sonnet 46 

Stars and Eyes 12 

St. Bruno and His Six 19 

The Angel of Unrest 49 

Tee Fields of Love 43 

The Ideal 17 

The Initiate 30 

The Imminent 68 

The Mocking-Bird 35 

The Novitiate 28 

Two Passions 15 

Vastness 22 

Waning Lights 16 

Wherein the Wrong ? 59 

Youth 32 



10 



POEMS OF 
FRANCES GUIGNARD GIBBES 



Distribution 

" I NEED thee," said a poet as he passed 
And plucked the single immrose from a stem, 
So proud to only hold its burden there ; 
" I need thy loveliness to grace my verse, 
Which move a wider range of hearts than here 
Thy subtle beauty in this lonely woods." 

" I need thee," said the Universal One, 
Plucking a human flower from a heart 
That seemed to only beat because it bore 
The love and beauty of one being there ; 
" I have a wider purpose for that soul — 
I need her love to grace my Universe." 



11 



Stars and Eyes 



O MYRIAD stars, steadfast stars, ye shine, 

Forever changeless while the myriad eyes, 

All yearningly upturned, fain to divine 

Some height or depth of Being's mysteries, 

Have through the ages furled those lustrous spheres, 

The rivals of your mystic, shimmering rays. 

With all those pleading questionings 

Unanswered still, the tears 

Mayhap unrecompensed, they pass to ways 

Unseen, to meet — who knows — what reckonings ? 

II 

Sweet eyes of love have sought ye ever, stars, 

As finding there, within your steadfast gleams, 

A sympathy — unmixed of mortal fears — 

With love's immutability. Soft dreams 

Of passion's endlessness float, like a haze, 

Enswirling all the spaces of the sky — 

Each nucleus a changeless star 

Insinuating ways 

Of love, immortal ways ; satiety, 

A human thought that wings of love outsoar. 

12 



Ill 

Crazed, anguished eyes of love betrayed have sought 

Within your cruel, dizzying heights, cold stars, 

Redress for deadly desolation wrought 

Through treachery ; and breasts that brutal scars 

Of change have seared, have cursed your changelessness 

Which holds alluring promises for love 

That end in shuddering perfidy 

And reeling hollowness. 

Those twisted, tortuous ways of life that prove 

The endless Universe a mockery ! 

IV 
Some star, soft mother eyes have watched, and prayed 
With invocation for a tender thing. 
In motherly adjustment closely laid 
Within her sheltering arms. The years that bring 
Maturity and change shall rob her arms 
For life or death, yet close within her heart 
And eyes she clasps that tenderness. 
No chilling fortune harms 
Her passionate maternity ; no hurt 
Of searing time may age its agelessness. 

V 
The seeker's dauntless eyes, from star to star, 
In ranging, tireless search upturned to pierce, 
Perchance, some truth from out those glinting, far. 
Free lights of God that flash a Universe 
Unfathomed, where the straining, craving mind 
May sight the beaconing, boundlessness of space. 
Content if from the spangled night 
Its steadfast vigil find 

Some bounded truth, since limits still embrace 
The limitless — a star, the infinite. 

13 



VI 
Up past ye, stars, into the vast Unseen, 
Swift prayers of passion rise like leaping fire, 
Imploring some faint sign from God. Between 
Your points they seem to pass, each fond desire, 
Up to an Infinite suggested here 
In miniature by spirit-summoning stars. 
Outposts of heaven, our prayers ye guide 
On past the starry sphere. 
And send sweet hope to mortal worshipers 
Of days to come when prayers are satisfied. 

VII 

Stars, o'ershadowing stars, your steadfast beams. 

Age after age, illume the shifting days 

And fleeting passions of our mortal dreams ; 

Each star of light, each heart of love obej's 

Some law, some purpose of the Infinite. 

O constant stars, not more of heaven ye hold 

Than souls of human restlessness. 

Shine on refulgent light, 

One truth your rays and mortal hearts unfold : 

An everlasting change in changelessness. 

[A scientific critic has objected to stars being classed as change- 
less, when, as a scientific fact, changes are noticed. This fact was 
considered while the poem was being written, yet it was outweighed 
by the poetic fact of human experience, that stars for ages shine on, 
apparently the same, while myriads of human eyes pass away.] 



14 



Two Passions 

Vast ocean, beating like a throbbing heart 

With some deep, passionate, tumultuous love, 

As though the uttermost depths within thee strove 

Thy \A'ild, pulsating fervor to impart 

To thy great Mistress. Should her pulses start 

In answer to thy motion, should she move, 

AU-ardently, to meet thy fervent love. 

What havoc to the world would then be wrought ! 

With all her immobility, she knows 

A calm, deep passion fiercer than thine own. 

Great raging fires lash about her soul. 

And yet, with strength indomitable, she shows 

No sign in answer to thy restless moan, 

But teaches life the might of self-control. 



15 



Waning Ligfhts 

The light is waning into shadowy night ; 
The gleaming answers of the earth are still ; 
The shimmering flowers and the glittering rill 
Alike have furled their signals since no light 
Aloft is calling in bright fellowship ; 
The songs of eve are silenced, and the earth, 
Awaiting morning with its quickened birth, 
Has sunk into that sweet, deep rest of sleep. 

The light is waning from beloved eyes ; 
Those mirrors of the myriad sights of life. 
Outworn and weary, seek a sweet relief 
And wait until the last faint glimmer dies 
Of earth, their biding place ; the flickering breath 
Grows fainter as grows dim the tired eyes, 
And to the murmur of half-uttered sighs 
They sink into that sweet, deep rest of death. 



16 



The Ideal 

Mine eyes were yet aglow with baby gleams 

Empyreal when first thou earnest to me, 

Great angel, guardian of my soul ! I see 

Thee standing now as first I saw in beams 

Of purple, in the twilight there ; all seems 

A vision radiant ! When charging thee 

To guard, my mother left — I opened free 

My baby soul, and soared to thee in dreams. 

In thy great eyes I felt a look I 'd caught 

Within my mother's face when I was ill 

And waked to find her watching me. The song 

I 'd wept for sounded with thy wings and brought 

Anew the tears. Thou comest to me still 

With eye-depths deepening all I feel and long. 



17 



A Crisis 

There is a time in early womanhood 

When all the forces of her soul arise 

And range themselves before her awakening eyes 

All in a tremble, as a suitor stood 

To watch the inclination of her mood. 

So stand they, showing possibilities 

Unformed of life, in all its subtleties, 

Like him who waits reply of her he sued. 

Should she reject them, lo ! they waste away 

And leave her to the realm of commonplace. 

Grow weaker with the waning of her days ; 

But should she clasp them closely, bid them stay, 

Their swelling forces with her life advance. 

Increasing ever their intensities. 



18 



St. Bruno and His Six 

An aimless drifting in luxuriousness 

To men with serious understratum brings 

At last revulsion violent with strained 

And overwrought yearnings for austerit}^ 

Since 't is the soul in desperation cries : 

" One further jot in easefulness, I die." 

'T was thus with Bruno and his Six who chose 

That mountain-top with naked walls of rock, 

With ice-glazed floors : a region desolate, 

Where elemental demons wreaked their spite 

Since those majestic walls immovable 

Stood, as in stubbornness and mockery. 

Defiant to the powers of the storm. 

For seven years this mystic band of seven 

Lived here in heartless huts all comfortless ; 

Each pledged himself a living scourge to sting 

The other six should any skirk a vow 

Or swerve a spider's thread from rigidness. 

This place — a plague-spot on the breast of earth - 

They chose to purge their hearts of feebleness 

And gain a tone and vigor for the soul. 

'T was here, in place of soothing melodies. 
They chanted hymns of warning, dire and fierce, 
And ominous, that bloodhound-like outsprung 
The kennels of the heart, then crouched a space 
With sudden yelpings in the crevices — 

19 



On-leaped in fury o'er the jutting crags ; 

Ketrieving thence with whetted fierceness, home 

Returned to breed a sterner brood of sound. 

'T was here, in place of silken-sheeted down, 

They slept on hard and roughened boards, with shirts 

That pricked their ease-enfeebled flesh, to ensure 

That even their dreams were shadowed by a scourge. 

Instead of draperies with heavy fold. 

The broidered arras with its blazoned scenes, 

The rich-toned paintings, splendid to the eye. 

The lawns of emerald with gorgeous flowers, 

The outward eye encountered walls of gray 

Which gave a sombre tincture to the soul. 

Their wine, that in the days of luxury 

Was mellowed juice of lucious grape, was now 

The keen and acrid draughts of ice-toned air. 

In times of yore their mistresses had been 

Soft women, golden-haired, and languorous-eyed ; 

One mistress now alone the seven knew, 

And she was rigid-eyed Austerity. 

But He, the High One, speaking through the sky, 

Where evening sunsets made a golden path ; 

Through lichens tentacled upon the rock ; 

Through birds that from the valley dared the height ; 

Through fervid heart-beats 'neath the jaded flesh, 

Again a warning knelled in Bruno's soul : 

" My beauty is thy need, thy heritage." 

And Bruno heard these messages from High 

And knew — so true his nature's earnestness — 

To cramp the soul, excluding joy and love, 

Is death as surely as through easefulness. 



20 



In Minor Tone 

Outside, the elm twigs beat the window-pane, 
Like some poor anguished hand, in ceaseless woe ; 
The darkness thickens and the slanting rain 
But adds a minor tone in mournful flow 
And deepens bj' a note the wailing wind. 

Some lone, sad-crying bird, lost in the storm, 
Flies through the thicket with a startled sweep, 
The casement shutters crash as in alarm, 
Insinuating still another deep 
And direful cadence to the waiUng wind. 

The shadowy shapes seen through the thickened air 
Seem brooding o'er some ominous event ; 
The very tree-tops quiver in a fear, 
And saplings, as in stricken misery bent. 
Send each an echo to the wailing wind. 

A minor strain strikes inward to my heart 
And, shuddering, quickens shattered dreams of old. 
Lost faces, friends foresworn, from memory start, 
In mocking sweetness tantalize my soul. 
Which sends its echoes to the wailing wind. 



21 



Vastness 

God doth not give His vastness through the sea, 

And plain, and mountain-height alone, nor through 

The lofty silence of the star-lit sky 

At eventide. All these are great and show 

Him in a symphony majestical. 

But best He shows Himself when lavishly 

Creating, makes a universal man 

Who sees not merely as the passions in 

Him see, but lets the Universal see. 

Espying facts, he sends forth energies, 

Bird-like, to soar, and dart, and dive, then bring 

Him sprigs of truth with which He twines a wreath 

Of Universal Truth to crown the brow 

Of all humanity. 'T is then that best 

Is shown God's vastness : through a human soul. 



22 



Shorn Wings 

Thou wast so swift and strong a moment since, 

Bright bird, when thou wast flying past my window with 

Thy mate ! What evil chance gave impulse to 

Thy wings to turn from where the roofless vast 

Would let thee soar forever still resistless if 

Thou couldst? Yet thou didst swerve to enter where 

Man binds by walls his dwelling place, too low 

And narrow for the aspiration of thy wings. 

Now thou hast beat thy life out, and lie there 

Nought but in form a bird. How I acclaim 

Thy wild nobility that made thee, will, 

Thy freedom or thy death ! Not so with him, 

The Human One, who holds thee but a lower life, 

Yet lets the comforts of the fire-side, 

The food, the drink, the ease of those four walls 

Content him with trite custom's narrowness. 

Faint-hearted one ! who trims his own wings with 

Convention's shears for fear he might be led 

To fly too far and wander from the Tried. 



23 



My Inwardness 

Thou who in thy great heart my deeds e'er dost 
Embosom deep, and seest me through love's Hght, 
Canst thou my Ufe most truly read aright ? 
Perchance the keen and cruel rapier thrust 
Of enemies best bares my heart — I trust 
The Inward Vision's verity, then might 
Myself best know myself? Complete insight 
Comes not to those encompassed here with dust. 
The sum of all our measures yet should be 
A total truthfulness. Thine eyes would glean 
The good, mine enemies the evil. Shard, 
Emerald and opal form an occult three, 
Too great the balance, yet the most unseen ; 
Then what I am is what I am to God. 



24 



Makingf a Masterpiece 

I 

It was wrought, the first flute, by a soul who had heard 

the Great God, 
Who had caught a blest note from that wondrous voice 

which mufit sound 
Evermore through his life to the life of the earth. The 

marked soul 
Who thus fatally hears is endowed with a trust, and he 

knows 
All his life is this trust ; thus atune to the Infinite One, 
He knew that he, Seth, was elect to create just this flute. 

II 

Imbued with his trust's sacredness, Seth forsook all his 

kind 
For a time, chose to dwell far remote from the man-made 

world. 
To preserve the pure sense of his ears innocent from the 

cry 
Of despair or the curse of rage ; knew before he might 

frame 
A rare instrument, he must be in himself all the force. 
All the fineness, the sweetness he would have issue 

forth. Elate 
With the truth, Seth worked with a toil that was joy ; he 

hearkened 
To sound with a sensitive ear and its meaning he learned 
Through a sensitive soul. 

25 



Ill 

He would go to the Nile-bank and list to its flow from the 

sands 
Through the reeds, where the palms came between, with 

his ear on the earth 
Or astrain from the trees, and so gradually guaged the least 

change 
In the tone, from a boat on the breast of the Nile, where 

the waves 
Swished and lapped, to the sigh faint and low at the 

vanishing point 
Of the sound. Thus he toiled till he knew, with his eyes 

bound around. 
If a bird or a palm were the thing intervened twixt his ear 
And the source of the sound. Even so hearkened he to 

the birds' 
Morning songs ; even so did he list to the wind through 

the reeds, 
To the call of each beast for his mate, till he learned every 

voice 
In its tremors and tones, where he dwelt in this wild of 

the woods. 



IV 
The most perfect of reeds then chose Seth that had grown 

to the song 
Of the swift-flowing Nile, and he wrought his rare flute 

with a care 
Almost pain, for he made every length, every breadth, 

every stop, 
Every notch, each to each of its kind, with regard not 

alone 
For itself, but the rest. 



V 

With his flute, Seth went back to the world and he blew 

all he learned 
Through his toil ; the harmony fraught with accompanying 

chords 
Which the Universe gives, forever attune to its parts. 
The melody sang Seth's own heart, sang the strain of his 

life. 
And the mingle flowed forth with vibrations which pierced 

the mere man 
As he is to the world, and fixed the deep soul at its source. 
Hark ! the innermost ear of each man then discerned 
An echoing, answering strain, which arose from his heart ; 
Thus Seth taught them to list — not to him — to the song 

of their souls ; 
And they heard, forced to hear, 't was God's voice that 

Seth blew through his flute. 



27 



The Novitiate 

Scoff not thou, honest toiler of the earth, 
If thy late comrade, with his eyes aflame, 
Should pass along the field thou tendest there 
And heed thee not, thou or thy noble toil ; 
Know he is treasure-bearer to the King 
New-made, unused as yet with steadfast calm 
To bear those priceless treasures which he holds. 
So late emerging from the commonplace, 
He fears lest some nide jar will cause him lose 
The charge intrusted with him by the King. 
Once he was with thee, toiling even as thou, 
Nursing the very earth thou turnest there, 
Tending the growing crops with patient care ; 
No difference might be found twixt him and thee, 
Until once when the mid-day's heat beat fierce 
He leaned upon his plough to wipe his face, 
Then by a sudden chance upturned his ej'es 
And saw a field-lark soaring through the blue 
To take her noontide rest among the trees 
High on the hill-top where the wind blew cool. 
Those rising wings disturbed his native peace ; 
A want unfathomable crept within 
His heart ; nor could he plough his furrows straight 
Since restless longings drew his thoughts away. 
Thou dost recall his hasty leave from thee 
And all his fellow-workers of the fields ; 



Thou thoughtst it hard that unexplained he went ; 

Yet what had he to say, since naught he knew 

Save one all-urging fact that he nuist go. 

What difference was there, then, twixt him and thee? 

None ; save that with his soul-eyes he had seen 

The upward flight of two aspiring wings. 

In other lands he found new hills and dales, 

New atmosphere, and arduous, untried tasks ; 

Oft did he pause, disheartened in his toil. 

To wish himself a laborer still with thee. 

Until once, through unlooked-for light, he found 

He held possessions more than common man 

And knew them as the treasures of the King. 

If in thy heart thou still hast tenderness 

For him who was thy comrade in old days. 

Wait thou but patiently when he shall learn 

Those treasures which he bears can ne'er be lost 

When once possessed ; then will he come to thee 

To seal a closer union than before. 

Shall raise thee where he stands ; through thee, himself 

Shall raise ; since from thy heart alone he wins 

The uttermost-prized treasure of the King. 



29 



The Initiate 

Soft, through portals of the stillness pealing 
For hearing ears, sweet angel music swells ; 
Clear, through ])rison bars of darkness stealing. 
For seeing eyes, God's radiant glory wells. 
Yet still grope on the human herd, feeling 
The way head down, nor upward heed for fears. 
And cry aloud for light nor see through tears. 
From out this starless night of black despair 
Comes one from God, with truth divine and free ; 
Head thrown erect, he walks and knows no fear — 
No clangor in his soul bars angels' plea. 
Attuned, he hears, and all the people hear ; 
Through his pure eyes Heaven's light may enter free. 
Undazed, he sees, and all the people see. 



30 



Love's Tribute 

Play me no songs on wailing violin 

As lovers do in rising serenade 

Sound wooing sighs that with the music fade 

And leave a longing where the song has been ; 

Fling me no lilies, sweet, to weave within 

My hair's luxuriance, to grace each braid 

A space, then drooping leave a stain that made 

A glory once, sad emblem dark of sin ! 

For thou must sing just thy pure heart to me 

And let its motive ever be thy name, 

Its measured rhythm but thy steadfast love 

That beats deep with my life. My flowers, see, 

Are thy caressing eyes that shine the same 

And 'luminate my being as I move ! 



31 



Youth 

I HEED no count of mortal years, my heart 
Is young as yonder song — his first love-song 
That bird is singing as he soars, with strong, 
Swift wing-beats, mighty in his love ; my heart 
Loves with his, soaring, too, and is a part 
Of his deep joyousness. I sit among 
The grasses, 'mid the new-blown buds, and long 
Till longing makes all sense of self depart, 
And I am young and tender with the bloom 
Of spring. Out in the world there form debars 
Communion. In the night-time, with the sod 
For resting place, I soar from spirit's tomb 
To feel the grand, hushed stillness of the stars 
Till I am Youth Eternal, one with God. 



32 



Interpretation of Titian^s *^ Assumption'* 

She rises through a perfect womanhood 

In floods of mupic floating up to God ; 

Herseems an age ago she had withstood 

The yearning arms of those below so hard 

To leave, but now upon a rosy cloud 

She rests, her sweet lips parted, wondering, 

While baby-angels, tender-eyed, there crowd 

Around and radiantly triumphant sing 

Her Motherhood. Scarce heeding, though, their strain, 

Her gaze is fixed upon the Father's eyes 

As if to satisfy the wonder, fain 

To ask His ways. Hovering in higher skies, 

Two seraphim who shining crowns secure 

To crown her shrined the Mother of the Pure. 



33 



Opportunity 

The day is waning silently, 
The shadow creepeth steadily. 
Since each day holds a special good, 
See that to thee 't is understood. 
For gone it will be presently. 



34 



The Mockingf-Bifd 

Sweet poet of the air, whose notes reflect 
Thy singing fellows in the world of tone, 
From thy starred perch of jassamine, there alone 

In that sweet-scented pine, thou soul elect! 
A bird philosopher with sight divine. 
To penetrate and hold the Great Design, 

Interpreting as one of intellect. 

The melting love-note of the mourning dove 
From thy vast repertoire sings forth again. 
In those low, mellowed sighs, devoid of pain, 

Where grief grows pleasure to the voice of love 
So sweet, so passionate, so full of sobs ; 
Replete with pleading eyes, with pulsing throbs 

The heights and depths of sad and sweet inwove. 

Thou hast divined the honest-ringing chime, 
Pealing, full-toned, from the clear-voiced lark, 
Like chants of clean-souled reapers as they work, 

So wholesome and complete, suggesting time 
Of perfectness ; the call and counter-call 
In rondure and in cadenced rise and fall, 

Of morning melody, of evening hymn. 

35 



The merry frolic of the Bob-o-link * 

Thou renderest upon thy stage of song, 
And skimmest o'er the notes with tripping tongue, 

As he, thy jocund jester, with his cUnk 
Of cymbals and the hint of cap and bells. 
Acted in tones suggestive ; sound which tells 

His life-theme — blithe and merry Bob-o-link. 

With innocence and trusting purity 

The Pee-wee sings her wistful song through thine, — 

Thou wondrous songster of the gleaming vine, — 
Suggesting helplessness and infancy ; 

A tender immaturity, which pleads 

A heart compassionate to fill its needs 
And makes of motherhood divinity. 

That wailing, anguished cry thou utterest, 
Perchance some mateless sea-bird shrieked in dole ; 
A haunting cry which speaks a muffled soul, 

Forced outward by the stifled, heaving breast, 
That home of mighty hopes all unfulfilled. 
Where ecstasies were born but to be stilled, 

So strange, so wild that cry, so comfortless ! 

Amid the rest, not separate but attune, 

The Thrush's low, serene religious call, 

Which lucidates the holiness of all 
And adds a loveliness, like yon festoon 

Of gold-starred blossoms, to the swaying pine ; 

So one in sympathy and love divine 
Those rising sounds where all the songs commune. 

And thou, sole singer of the vine, from thee, 
Thy vibrant throat alone, these songs arise, 
Portraying sound in all its mysteries, 

As wide as life in life's immensity. 

36 



In thy glad caroling thou dost unite 
Full many voices in one deep delight 
And makest oneness of diversity. 

Illumed interpreter of life, that life 
Which sings as one through many songs, 
What inspiration to thy soul belongs 

Which makes an inward vi^hole the outward strife! 
Thou dost in thy sweet, mingled melodies 
Outsing the tenets of philosophies 

And carol truths that dive as deep as life. 



37 



Invocation 

I, THROUGH my soul's great wail to know its kind, 

To strain its royal kindred to itself, 

Ask yearningly, ask pleadingly, that Thou 

Through all thy varied ways make manifest 

With greater depth, unswerving surety, 

A mellower fullness, all that calls my soul ; 

Thy wind with rushing tumult through the trees 

Sings with a cry, wild, free, untamable, 

" Come, sister soul, to join my song and me ! " 

Thy deep-voiced ocean, wondrously intoned, 

Chants, ever restlessly and ceaselessly. 

All Nature's poems of the fields and sky: 

The adoration of the arbutus flower. 

Cloud symphonies, ascending forest prayers — 

While singing up to Thee I catch their strain. 

The many-throated voice of joyous day, 

The silent, awesome voice of mystic night. 

That craving soul-cry from the human heart, 

Each tells my inwardness, "Thou art of me." 

To every call my soul with answering cry 

Leaps outward, upward, fain would claim its own 

In freedom's fullness ; yet some stifling power 

Compels it backward, even while it springs 

To take the uttermost bound wherewith to blend 

Itself in harmony inseparable 

With all the royal kindred of its clan. 

38 



" A greater depth " ! The very words dive deep 

Into the tumult of my soul, arrest 

Its longings for a space ; but there outside 

A singing lark stirs some unknown, some strange, 

Unfathomable want ; not through the notes 

Which ring aloud, but through the throbbing tones, 

The undertones beneath the song, which sing 

The more by leaving most unsung. Ah, then 

My soul would tinish what he leaves unsung ; 

But as the lark so its aspiring voice 

Tries, wails low, then dies away in sobs. 



Mystcfioos Ligfht 



Mysterious lights, elusive as a breath, 

As some fine vision born of sleep as rare, 
Yet strong to rule the destinies of death, 

Of life, of mortal passions — dark despair 
Or shining joyousness. The deadened light 

Of dungeons, limpid, tranquil light of streams 
And lake, the lurid lightning's streaks that smite 

To cruel desolation, or the beams 

Of tender stars are fine in essence as dim dreams. 



II 

Mysterious lights of sunset, when soft gold 
Through floating clouds of violet and rose 

Shines vibrantly, and beauties manifold 
Of earth unseen at blazing noon disclose 

Their looming loveliness, like some shy soul 
Who shuns the glare of life to shine subdued 

By her loved fireside. Ah, bountiful 
And varied universe, that doth include 
Affinities of light for life's beatitude. 

40 



Ill 

Mysterious lights reflected, of the earth, 
Of glassy leaves and grasses, gleaming flowers, 

Of butterflies, and bubbling springs where mirth 
Seems laughing out to light the fleeting hours, 

Or beaded, pearly lights the passing showers 
Have hung upon the spiders' gossamer lace 

In woodland dells sweet with azalea bowers. 
And golden jassamine hung in flowing grace 
On gentlj' swaying pines that guard this elfin place 

IV 

Mysterious lights, through vast Infinity, 

From sphere to sphere in space each sentry sun, 

Sending its message of immensity, 
Is answered by a glory like its own — 

A glory wresting from the dark unknown 
The truth of endless being. On they send 

Their lights compassionate, illuming moon 
And planet ; these their whirling paths attend 
And gather radiant bounties but to flash again. 



Mysterious lights, in colored tints and shades, 
Sending their loveliness to deck the world : 

The flash of golden fire-flies from glades 

Of wet, sweet woods, the flaming trails, as hurled 

Through space, a meteor leaves in flight, the pure 
And hallowed aureate glow, that through tall pines 

In dim and vistaed forests, all secure 
From man's profanity, serenely shines 
To light with hallowed peace these God-erected 
shrines. 



VI 
Mysterious light, pure from the soul of God, 

With immortality suffusing life 
As softly as a golden mist the sward, 

The flowers and trees in dreamy summers rife 
With melodies of birds and perfumed air. 

mystic soul, in autumn leaves aflame. 
Subdued in violets, in lilies fair 

And gleaming, soft in eyes and yet the same ; 

Thatdeepest ray of all which speaks the soul supreme. 



The Fields of Love 

My soul, beloved, like the rising sap 

Leaps up and yields to thee thu^ fatally 

All bared yet unashamed. Mine eyes have asked 

A question and thine own, as pure as dew 

Upon the bride-white rose, have answered me 

And I am satisfied. 'T is thus alone 

All purged of grosser sense I let them drink 

The welling love from mine and call thee to 

The fields with me and love. 

MORNING 

The fields are living with the spiinging grass 
O'ershadowed by the flush-tinged Kalmia-flowers, 
Azaleas duster 'mid their tender leaves ; 
Our love is as the unstained love of flowers. 
The trees are quivering with tiie flight of birds, 
The air is trembling with ascending songs ; 
Thy love and mine is as the song of birds. 
The morning sun is spangling all the fields 
Thy love and mine like sparkles of the sun. 
A bridal veil of haze has draped the earth, 
White-blossoming cherry-trees her garlands make ; 
A bridal veil of love falls on our hearts, 
Our garlands are white thoughts of purity. 
Into one subtle harmony the mist 
On yonder sloping orchard blends the rose 
Of peach-bloom and the apples silver-green. 

43 



'T is thus that love has mingled thee and me, 
Two separate lives, into one harmony. 
The sunbeams shower on the answering trees, 
So thy sweet looks are showered on my heart, 
Mine eyes responding like the answering trees. 
Those pulsing songs are beating through the air, 
Our hearts are throbbing like those pulsing songs. 
The dew refle(;ts the tints of all the fields, 
Our souls reflect the haloes of bright love. 
So we and this fresh morning live as one. 



Here 'neath the shadowy pines a mellower light 

Is stealing, making lace-work of the earth ; 

In twinkling patterns gold and purple blend. 

Subdued is now the morning's gayety. 

The flowers droop beneath the noontide sun. 

So I, beloved, would be still awhile 

To let my thoughts float like those butterflies, 

And see half dreamily the wedding-rings 

Curled on thy fingere with my yellow hair. 

Or upward glancing where the radiant leaves 

Touched by the sun-gold hover as if free 

In air, their fragile stems unseen, so deep 

The shadow there made by the zenith sun. 

Or else to watch the hazy atmosphere 

Which seems as made of tiny silver rings 

Encircling and inweaving languorously 

In soft mesmeric motions, each with each. 

The pines sway to each other lazily 

And linger, whispering ere they part again. 

Against their rich and mellowed foliage 

The young and tender syrays of sassafras, 

Of birch and dogwood glisten airily. 

44 



A subtle, mingled fragrance fills the wood ; 
Azalea, sassafras and pine unite 
To laden all the sense with languidness ; 
The stream below is murmuring soothingly 
And all this noontide life is poised in rest. 

KVKNING 

The golden flush, beloved, fades away. 

That sweeping angel's wing is darkening like 

A fallen angel now. Unrivalled by 

The colors of the sky, the clustered grape 

Leaves shine in all their gentle roseate tints 

And bright, new candles of the pine fulfill 

Their wonted office cheerfully. This faint 

And tender twilight, like some loving soul. 

Reveals the beauties of the field, unseen 

By day, in all her dazzling gayety. 

So I, in this sweet evening time, have found 

A deeper, calmer meaning to our love, 

Inspired by the still serenity. 

See, one star low and luminous appears, 

Shining from trembling ether steadfastly, 

And fixes, 'mid upbracing spirit, thoughts 

As luminous and grandly still in me. 

That star is like thine eyes that promised mine - 

Serene and pure and tender as the star, 

Both hinting secrets of eternity. 



45 



Sonnet 

Her nature, like that rare transparent flower 
Which takes its color from the butterflies ; 
From bright-winged insects with their myriad eyes, 
And answers to the day whose moving showers 
Of spangles change its mood with every hour. 
Again, in evening, when the daylight dies, 
Its petals darken, trembling with the sighs 
Of winds vibrating o'er the grassy bower. 
So grows this maid with nature sensitive. 
Who weeps with all the sorrows of her kind, 
Who laughs and dances with their joy and mirth — 
A quickened instrument attuiie to life ; 
A living sympathy with heart and mind 
Sharing the light and shadows of the earth. 



46 



Sketches from Nature 

A GIANT cherry-tree stretches a tent- 
Like canopy with fruit and leaf of green 
And through the interstices the silver sky. 
In front its purple shadow on the grass 
Flecked with the sun-gold. 
Bees are buzzing around ; 
The butterfly is floating with his love 
In this soft, golden, hazy afternoon. 

A sensuous drowsiness o'erhangs the earth. 
And here 'mid the clover and the briar, 
And daisy blooms, myself am laden with 
The afternoon, and heai- as in a dream 
The answering call of birds, and see as through 
A mist the sunshine on the hill, and smell 
As from afar the sweetlv-scented grass. 



47 



Royalty 

To-day I am a queen npon a throne ; 

To no dust-mouldered kings I owe descent, 

But thy great living heart whose love has lent 

My blood its royalty. Each tender tone 

Thou speakest to me fills anew mine own 

Glad heart, and pulses through my veins intent 

On filling every fibre with its pent 

Up bliss which tells, " I love not now alone." 

Is any queen who reigns so great as I ? 

What though her crown emblazon jewels brought 

From Orient shrines — I need no jeweled means 

As symbols of my queenly claims ; for by 

Sweet angels were my crown and sceptre wrought. 

And thy great love has crowned me Queen of queens 



48 



The Angel of Unrest 

Onck in a midnight, stricken through a cry 

Of woe, I held to stern account the Soul ; — 

In petulance, demanding as my right 

To know, why evil was, and misery 

Inflicted ? And the word was hurled in scorn 

To mock and taunt the Soul. So I, like some 

Ingrate, a pensioner — disgruntled since 

For only half a day the sun shone through 

His window-pane — stung by that cry of woe, 

Complained and would not hear, nor did I wish 

To hear the answer which I knew was there, 

Up in the heights of Self where Justice is. 

But when the Self was calm the answer came 

Uusought. I saw the motive of the life 

Of him who mourned before the woe had come ; 

A sweet content, a willingness to float 

In circles like the Dragon-fly and let 

The swift-winged sky-lark soar to heights that he 

Had never dreamed of from that stagnant pool ; 

But when the Pain twinged, lo ! he flew aloft 

And made his goal the topmost pine-tree bough. 

Illumed, with wider vision I beheld 

The cleansing revolutions of the earth 

How goaded on by that arch-mover, Pain, 

Who like the voice that urged the Wandering Jew 

Hunts out the laggard in his slothful sleep 

And by the shoulder shakes him till he move 

To join the onward workers of the world. 

49 



Recognition 

This recognition is our heritage 
Forever ranging from the small to great 
In endless meeting, endless parting, each 
With each. The glad suffusing thrill to meet. 
The aching empty pang to part ; from birth 
To death the flood of fulness soon to leave, 
A void of yearning once again to fill. 

Spring with her cyclic call, that call of quick, 
Eefreshing sprightliness, awakes the sleep 
Of winter, and a myriad answers come 
In recognition from each glade and hill. 
With all their quickened being, every cell 
Of violet, arbutus, daffodil. 
Replies, absorbing from the earth and air 
Each part to fill the varying needs of form, 
Of color, perfume ; each doth recognize 
His own, and takes it from the elements. 
All tending in one growing unity 
To satisfy the coming fruit and flower. 

The summer-fledgling knows the spring, and sings 
A melody replete with bud and bloom 
And rising joyousness ; a love-tone steals 
Amid, and mingles with his caroling, 

50 



And singp, in answer from another throat, 
In subtle tones, the sign of mating time. 
So when the brood is hatching songs grow soft, 
Subdued and gentle, then the mother's chirp. 
In recognition of creation's law. 



Two new-met mortals look each unto each, 
Then sinking to the heart that look which tells 
A need, the heart sends back a love-light to 
The eyes, which look again, illumined now 
AVith yearning fire, which draws sun-like each soul 
The other till that throbbing want in full 
Is recognized and love is satisfied. 



The child new-born feels for her mother's breast 
Untaught, untold, finds not with eyes or ears 
Those fountains growing into life with her, 
But with a subtle sense, a sense from some 
Defineless Source, doth recognize the breast 
Her royal board, partakes, is satisfied 
Till hunger wakes a need to grow again 
And add to living through another's life. 

The new-made mother at that tender touch 
Thrills rapturously to find a want fulfilled. 
Matured are now the uses of her breasts. 
Thus satisfied in sweet adjustment they 
To circling baby lips, lips formed from her 
To round her woman-nature and her love. 
Suflfiising tenderness leaps into life 
And floods her being into gentleness 
Through recognition of a law complete. 

51 



Thus at each seeming new, untried event 

There comes this recognition, and the need 

To meet and cope it is supplied from some 

Unfathomed source within the depths of Ufe. 

What is this recognition of the bird, 

The flower, and the human heart that binds 

All in a common sympathy ? The buds 

Take to themselves all needful for their life ; 

The birds, with somewhat wider needs, absorb 

Their own ; the human heart, with cravings deep 

And tireless, forever strives to find 

And fill its needs, from baby hearts, on, on. 

Expanding to some all-including soul 

Who craves all things and holds them with his love. 

The truest, deepest thoughts seem never new. 

Since far from out that deep Divine there wells 

A common source, elusive, unexplored, 

Wherein this fatal recognition dwells 

As imminent, and manifests alike 

Through bird and blossom and the human heart. 



52 



Might 

As I MUSED on the strong of the earth, a wild wish to feel 

strong 
As the mightiest beings had felt in their one-time supreme 
At the zenith of life ; when the heart is o'erflowingly full 
With the might of the Self; when the earth, and the sea, 

and the sun. 
And the powers, the whole universe blends to expand and 

uplift 
Till there surges the force of the Whole in the being of 

One. 

So I took as the three types of strength that I 'd have for 

my own : 
First, the might of the life of mere living, obeying the 

laws 
Of the nature intrinsic, the way that the young lion does 
When he snatches his prey with no pang of the wrong, 

since his right 
Is to satisfy hunger with blood lately quick in a heart ; 
Then, the might of the human who lives from his heart to 

his kind, 
Through uplifting, and giving, and loving, compassion his 

law, 
While the realm for his work is the heart-throbs of pain 

and of joy ; 

53 



Last, the God-might in man as the nearest that mortals 

attain, 
When the brain, and the heart, and the soul all unite to 

exalt 
That High Same that is rife in the living of earth, is aware 
Of the Self as creator, created — the One and the All. 

I arose at the break of the dawning and went where the 

grass 
Grows the thickest, and laid me, all bare of my garments 

so close 
To the earth that I felt she was giving me succor she 

gives 
To the oak. There, upfacing the young sun, I drew down 

the force 
That he sends through his love for the earth to create a 

quick world. 
While each pore of my body sucked in the live air that 

encircled 
SuflFusingly sweet, fresh and soft, till filled full with the 

strength 
Of the morning I leapt with a cry wild and glad, fresh and 

strong. 
For I felt in the fulness of living a lion in might. 

I went forth again in the noon-day, the time when the 

sun 
Is direct overhead, as a type of compassion, since he yields 
Not his favor to one more than all. Among the starved 

lives 
In a hovel I found an ill baby whose mother had died 
At his birth ; my heart swelled great with pity to see that 

pinched face 

54 



And those pure baby eyes as though pleading with pain. 

I held him, 
And hushed him, strained close to my breast with a 

yearning to give 
Unto that weakened life a fresh impulse that came from 

my own. 
Then I desperately strained all my being to transmit my 

love 
For his succor, and lo ! as I gave there came back unto me 
A great deluge of love, as if flowing from that tiny life 
With incentive to love all the life of the earth, so I loved 
All that lived with thanksgiving since he smiled up to me 

free from pain ; 
And I felt through that infinite love as a Saviour in might. 

Still again at the tremble of twilight, when there 's a waver 

twixt day 
And the night, I went forth with the Soul to a plain free 

from strife. 
Far from man. All alone in that wonderful stillness I 

watched 
How the stars coine, each one to that place which is his in 

the plan ; 
Then my thoughts of the High came to me, and they 

ranged them as stars 
Of the night, and I knew them as real, and I felt them as 

true, 
For the soul surged above to confirm it "awake and 

aware," 
To create me in glory transcendent a God through the 

Truth. 



55 



Law 

I WILL not have thee bind my Ufe with chains 
The world has wrought to fetter men. I break 
My being free, defy thy shackles, make 
The laws that govern bird and bloom and rain 
My sovereignty, and as the wind disdain 
All rule save Self's wild law. Again, I '11 take 
Me where the shy arbutus hides, forsake 
Conventions; — when no fettered limb remains 
I '11 lie relaxed upon the throbbing earth 
To drink the deep, glad secrets freedom draws 
From All That Is, Avhich vast creator brings 
Intrinsic laws to govern every birth ; 
To Nature then I '11 go, and win my laws 
Of living from the great deep heart of things. 



56 



A Miracle 

Beloved being, wilt thy glory shine 

Forever steadfast as it shineth now, 

And shed its ray refulgent on my brow 

Made consecrate and pure through love of thine, 

Which I hold sacred as a priest the wine 

Or chrism in Holiest of Holies. My head I bow 

In all humility and ask that thou 

Annoint and hallow with love's mystic sign. 

Rapt in a wonder tremulous I stand, 

Not doubting, but amazed, for at my birth 

God only gave twixt others' stars a space ; 

But even as I gazed in gloom He planned 

A miracle and thy star loomed, then dearth 

Was joy that spii'its feel in Paradise. 



57 



Brotherhood 

Thou truth-entrusted poet pure and free, 
Swelling each heart with pride and power to say, 
E'en in thy master-song thou singest of me. 
Whence comes thy mystic, all-alluring way, 
That did his low estate know " I," the bee, 
Would in thy mirror know himself and say. 
With proud acclaim, "My heart," rejoicingly? 
Doth God in thy vast heart find purity. 
And even as the angels thee entrust 
To minister His truth in sweet security 
Thou holdst it treasure 'bove the common dust ? 
His law supreme, revealed in power through thee, 
Each spirit to all life doth life adjust — 
One shining soul illumes diversity. 



58 



Wherein the Wrong ? 

The Queen had returned from the pla)', and she paused at 

the casement half robed ; 
Paused to muse on the thoughts that the play had inspired. 

AVhat a picture she made ! 
With her forefinger caught in a chain at her throat, where 

a great ruby heart 
Dropped, all red as with blood, and the gold of her hair 

clinging close to caress 
The faint rose of her shoulders and breast, her young eyes 

agaze with a wide, 
Wistful light ; in her face was a mingle of sweetness and 

yearning and pain. 
For the pride of the queen was her great purity; to be true, 

thought and deed. 
To the King who was old and sedate, while with passionate 

youth all her life 
Was aglow, albeit no thought of a difference had come till 

to-night 
At the play, when her girlhood swept back with a rush ; 

all the longing she had 
For ideal Galihad, who would be only purer in loving but 

one. 
She gazed at the pictures that hung on the wall ; the old 

King in his robes, 

59 



Large as life, was surrounded by vestals and mothers of 

Christ, with but one 
Other rival, the pure Galihad, brave and young, in that 

small print beside. 
This was the thought that had sway for awhile, as she 

leaned with her cheek 
On her hand: Was she wrong? was the question she asked 

of her heart, since she wished 
Galihad was the King. 



60 



God's Erect 

I SPOKE with one who never knew the joy 

Of motion and the varied transports gleaned 

Thereby ; when still a child, with wistful eyes 

He watched his nimble-footed playmates climb 

The slender branches of the bounteous trees ; 

From thence to him with glee would shower nuts, 

Or else would spring across the field to catch 

Bright butterflies, and bring to him, with flushed 

And radiant faces, all the gayest ones. 

What heart-aches came with these kind gifts! He 'd give 

Them all to know the joy of one free bound, 

With lithesome motion, o'er the luring fields. 

Even when to manhood grown, with manhood's health, 

Like some poor captive slave he still was bound 

By crippled limbs, to watch while others knew 

The keen delights of hunting and the chase. 

His proud and sensitively-fashioned soul 

Felt sore their looks of pity as they passed. 

Yet when I saw his true and unstained glance 

I scorned to mourn for him, knew he was one 

Of God's erect, whose soul goes through the world 

With manly stride ; and through the light his life 

Had thrown across my path, I saw full many 

A lithe-limbed earthling whom I mourned as lame — 

ReaJ cripples of the world through crippled souls. 



61 



Serenity 

Skrbne and still the aoftly-shadowed glade ; 

The songs of morning have a silence grown, 
Yet some sweet, silent anthems still pervade, 

Like scent of olive with the olive gone. 

Serene and still, the first appearing star 
Hung low and luminous in trembling air, 

A blessed benediction from afar, 
A singing message through the silence here. 

Serene and still my spirit as the glade ; 

Amid upbracing soul my thoughts arise 
Like stars, fraught with a peace the silence made. 

Filled with the music of the singing stars. 



62 



Justice 

Thou sorceress of God, with chastening eyes, 
Soul-burning eyes, look into mine and charm 
My senses with terrific trance ; no harm 
To truth canst thou inflict, scorch, than the lies 
That crouch within my heart. Unheeding sighs 
My weakness heaves, I '11 stand unflinching, calm, 
Beneath thy gaze, feel free each throe and qualm 
Of writhing sins and choke their coward cries. 
On cringing knees, and heads based low with sobs, 
"VVe ask the " gentle rain of mercy " sweet, 
Nor ween that storms must rage and lightning start 
Soul-purging fires. Unarmored, dare the throbs 
Of ruth ; unquailing, God's avenger meet — 
Justice is mercy to the pure in heart ! 



63 



Joy 

I 
Arise, thou innermost that is my soul, 

And tell to all the world thy joy, 
That deep, deep joy which, 'mid life's manifold 

Perplexities, no griefs destroy. 

Not fleeting pleasures, those which please a child, 
Through toys that while the passing hour. 

Nor flush of gladness unto maids beguiled 
With praise ; nor flatteries to power ; 

But joy which glows sustained and lambent while 

The fluctuating fires of life 
Leap up, then smoulder, flutter, and grow still, 

Obedient each, to ease, to strife. 

II 

Unfolding time, when dawn thrills into day, 
When motherhood floods through the heart, 

When songs of poets flash to ecstasy, 
Then joys their rarer gifts impart. 

A pale, faint pearl beneath the dome of night 

Pauses a space to soften earth, 
Like thoughts of absent friends, then flooding light, 

Like friends united, laughs in mirth. 

64 



Expectant hopes, wlien new, sweet thrills of love 

Reveal a hidden latency 
Half guessed till womanhood's fulfillment prove 

A full and ripe felicity. 

The stored-up sights and subtleties that rise — 
A blending of the soul and brain — 

And sing themselves in soaring ecstasies 
From poets' lips — a rapturous strain. 

Ill 

The joy of first-impassioned love, delight 
That changes child to womanhood, 

An ecstasy of youth and beauty, bright 
As moulted bird or bursting bud. 

Ah, pure delight, when plumes are growing gay, 
When buds are bursting into flowers 

And mating birds pour forth a rondelay 
Of love from out the leafy bowers!; 

Or when from out the careless, sporting child 

Woman emerging at love's call, 
With radiance and with wondering rapture^filled, 

Glows in a beauty mystical. 

IV 

The joy of those oasis days. The sun 

Some winter morning rising soft, 
The feathery arabesques of frost upon 

The grasses fade away. Aloft 

The lark is soaring as in May, and sings 
As though the tender spring were here 

W^ith love's own buoyancy to lift his wings 
To loftier realms of finer air, 

65 



When all the hazy, circling atmosphere 

Suffuses earth with saffron gold 
And steals within the heart, implanting there 

Pure Being's joy, its beam's infold. 



Deep joy, when anguish conquered by the might 

Of some strong soul invincible 
Finds pain intensifies the inner sight, 

Is but a mortal crucible 

To fuse those mystic powers of life 

And free to wider scope a flight 
Of angel couriers who search from cliflF 

To gulf, unveiling to the light 

Of mortal apprehension truths of God 
Unguessed in days of dreams and ease. 

The anguished soul who comes to joy has trod 
Bright realms unknown to lives of peace. 



VI 

The silent joy of twilight, when a flush 
Of stillness seems to flood the world, 

As if to silence God His earth would hush, 
When lights are dim and flowers are furled, 

To better whisper to the listening soul 
Some secret from His mysteries ; 

Then mortal natures are the flowers unfurled, 
Suffused with God's divinities. 

L.ofC. 



VII 

Beauty, that fleeting ministrant who feeds 

The flame of passion, vanishes ; 
Light love gives place to scorn, as flowers to weeds 

In plots no watcher cherishes. 

Dark skies and winter winds banish soft suns 

Of Indian summer, bringing snows 
And shivering need, while cold and illness stuns 

Bread-earners to o'erwhelming woes. 

The ecstasy of yesterday has flown 

Away like some elusive bird 
And leaves the poet in a mood forlorn — 

The strain is gone he erewhile heard. 

The quiet twilight peace leaves nights of tears, 

When restless shapes, intensified 
In darkness, crowd the tired brain with cares 

Of life and wants unsatisfied. 

Death takes the child and leaves the mother's breast 
Untouched where baby-fingers played ; 

Her anguished arms reach outward in unrest, 
But clasp the air — the child is dead ! 

YIII 
Ah ! but in loving we reveal a love, 

A joy within, beyond the cause. 
What though we love a craven we have loved. 

No sorrows hide what joys disclose. 

Deep source of joy, whate'er the circumstance 

That pierces to your ecstasies. 
The outward cause may live, may die, perchance, 

And yet thy changeless glory stays. 

67 



The Imminent 

I 

As ON a summer's day we look afar 

And yearn to meet the distant glade or stream, 
All mellowed by the azure atmosphere, 

Like landscapes of confused and hazy dreams ; 

Nor heed the roses blooming at our feet, 
Nor hear above our heads the trilling song, 

Nor breathe full breaths of olive fragrance sweet. 
Since fancied scenes and scents our senses throng. 

And yet the golden rose is ruby-tinged, 
The song is pulsing with fresh joyousness, 

The olive, in impassioned fragrance fringed 
And drooping, hangs in creamy tenderness. 

Man doth not find the beauty in the near, 
But ever wanders in a strained unrest ; 

A search whose end is but a deep despair, 
For lo ! the imminent conceals his quest. 

II 
We dream a dream of friendship's perfectness, 

Scanning ail-ardently each new-met face 
With mutually suing eyes, in hopefulness 

Our dreams within that heart find resting place. 



Perchance one tantalizing glimmer strays 
Through some uncovered crevice of the soul, 

Yet preconceived ideals clog up the ways 
And bar the suitor his envisioned goal. 

Thus hope soon dies, dies to be born anew 
In ever fainter tints for each new guest 

Who denser covers faith with dust of rue 
Until it lies deep-buried in the breast. 

Human hearts throb near us every day, 
Warmer and sweeter than those hearts of dreams 

Souls, flower-like, that open in a May 

Of love, expansive as the sun's young beams ; 

For us, the hearts that beat the nearest ours 
Hold subtler beauties than the saints aftir. 

Who scent the fragrance of the olive flowers 
When northern lands and wintery winds debar ? 

Fancy disguises, like a painted face, 

Gives standards all her own, and from the real 
Takes off" a subtle bloom but to deface, 

With care concealing what she should reveal. 

Mortals are we that ask a mortal test, 

Mortals inwove with inmiortality. 
Whose tense vibrations whisper, " truth is best," 

Transcending every ideality. 

Ill 
That stinging cry that echoes down the years, 

" Unfaithfulness ! unfaithfulness ! " which makes 
Young eyes of joy the haunt of scalding tears, 

Stifles the ardent breast that love forsakes. 



For love betraj'ed with traitors fills the earth 
And looks askance upon the world of men, 

Makes fertile gardens arid wastes of dearth 
And castles hovels, since his hut is mean. 

Yet, has the soul who finds the world awry 

Searched for the nearest truth in his own breast 

And hearkened to the meaning of that cry 
Which hurls a curse against unfaithfulness ? 

The heart protesting is a human heart 
As surely as the heart that did betray, 

Involving some occultly-laid rampart 
Profounder than the frailty of the clay. 

IV 
Like fleecy summer clouds or butterflies, 

Suggestions from the soul float through the mind. 
And all unheeded by the dreamer die, 

Impressionless as whifls of summer wind. 

We hear the quail's call from the woodland glade, 
For whims of appetite our snares we set ; 

A silver gleam darts through the water's shade, 
We bait the luring hook and cast the net. 

The opal glowing in the yellow earth, 

The shimmering cocoon's thread, the glint of gold. 
The rosewood with its rich and mellow growth. 

We recognize and grasp within our hold ; 

Yet shining thoughts float through the mind unheld : 
Few watchers wait who turn them as a gem 

Light-wise to lay their loveliness revealed 
Nor guess them from a royal diadem. 



V 

In finely-painted words we read of pain, 

A feted reveler in some far-off land ; 
Straightway the ever-restless heart would fain 

Find there the work of good it once had planned. 

The distant fevered form, diseased, forlorn, 
The wounded warrior, a city's wretched poor. 

Brings pity to the erratic heart of one 

Who turns the needy beggar from the door. 

As wave to wave upon the fusing sea, 
Our heart amid the universe of hearts, 

Each heart to each in fixed fatality, 
Each to the next profoundest force exerts. 

Heart unto heart, as wave to wave immerged, 
May fuse its pain or pleasure as it will ; 

Each near unnoticed breast some pain has scourged 
And mutely asks the sympathy we feel. 

VI 

The poet longs for mountains and the sea 
Or some expanding soul to free his verse. 

The painter for some rugged scenery 
Or masterpiece his talents to enforce. 

Scant is the poet's soul who finds not themes 
For myriad poems in the every day ; 

The painter meagerly endowed who dreams 
Of gaining inspiration far away. 

The master elevates the commonplace. 
Employs as ministers the dark and light, 

And genius finds that every day's embrace 
Potential poems from the Infinite. 

71 



VII 

As 'mid encircling clouds one span of sky 
Shines blue and clear behind the dingy gray, 

Amid the misty present men descry 
The future promise of a brighter day. 

And stud those future days with incident 

Of mortal mutability ; of love 
Fulfilled, of laurels gained ; not permanent 

Endowments which no time nor change remove. 

The wished-for circumstance arrives and brings 
The love or laurels, each involving still 

A wider yearning with its deeper pangs. 
And wants no present ever may fulfill. 

VIII 

The end of all these yearnings, wants denied, 
TJnrestfui wanderings and strained desires 

For satisfaction, never satisfied, 
These stifled hopes of all the heart aspires ? 

Struck through some subtle beauty of the skies. 
The low, sweet moon, the stars that overshine, 

Or pure, sweet soul-lights from the deeps of eyes 
Grown calmly tender through a sight divine. 

The eflTulgent stillness of the imminent 
From out the viewless fastness of the soul 

Dispels the fevered sense of discontent 
And satisfies the craving want we feel 

With intimations that the strained unrest 
Of mortal hearts, outworn and overspent, 

Is stilled at last to find the luring quest 
Awaits the wanderer in the imminent. 

72 



WAR 



MAR 26 1902 



COP\ DEI. TOCAT.DiV, 
;\-' ^"^ 1902 



